It’s not as warm here as I remember, but then again I suppose it is only the beginning of May. The hills here are very quickly turning from a lush green to straw…not quite yet, but you can see them becoming blonder - especially here on the coast.
Still, it feels like a new season is coming. The daylight hours stretch a little farther into the evening. Sand is filling in the reef on the beach just down the street. Years ago, my friend Pennie explained to me that there is a seasonal “sand cycle” here. That during the Winter, the sand is carried out into the ocean and in the Summer, it returns and the rocky beach becomes smooth with the sand’s return.
I’ve walked down to the ocean almost every day and many times twice a day. The edge of the world. I like being on the edge…I imagine a map and that where I am is as far as you can go. In ecology the transition between biological communities happens is called an ecotone. There is typically a great deal of life in the ecotone and so it is here with the human life…families with children come to discover life in the tide pools, weddings happen here at the edge… all times of the day there are people walking , sometimes you see people parasailing…surfing of course. A lot happens in that space in between. I love that.
Looking out at a horizon- especially a sea horizon, has a calming effect on the nervous system. It has a name: “horizon gazing". Maybe that’s why I like it so much- the calming effect. Even on the little island being where I could see the horizon gave a kind of hope- hint of a something “out there”. Sometimes at night when I waited for my husband to come home I would walk down to the water’s edge and look out at the night sky and the often spectacular clouds. It was almost surreal in how beautiful it was... And then there was this sunrise when I was very alone on the little island, just working on breathing after a difficult blow. Just me by the sea.
Do you know this song? It’s a little bitter-sweet…. Susan Cain, who wrote Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World that Can’t Stop Talking also wrote another book called Bitter Sweet: How Sorrow and Longing Make Us Whole. In Bitter Sweet she writes about how songs that have a have that sort of longing sadness are actually uplifting and comforting- they connect us to those very human emotions that we all share in common - that break down our walls and speak with such honesty and vulnerability. I love a good bittersweet song…
Some others I love are Patsy Cline songs like Crazy, Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah, John Prine and Bonnie Raitt’s Angel from Montgomery , Audrey Hepburn singing Moon River …and this one that brings my ex-husband to mind and tears… James Taylor Fire and Rain. It’s good to hear these tunes….it’s good to sit in those bitter sweet spaces…life isn’t black and white…there is a lot of gray. There is a lot of richness, growth and healing in those spaces.
We love the arts is because they make us feel something. Feeling connects us to life and our humanity. That’s why we watch movies, go to concerts, read books…look at art. We want to feel.
There is a podcast I have loved for a very long time hosted by Krista Tippet. She interviews the most thoughtful deep thinkers on that show…some of my favorite interviews are with Rick Rubin : Magic, Everyday Mystery and Getting Creative, Esther Perel: The Erotic is an Antidote to Death, and Mary Oliver “I Got Saved by the Beauty of the World”. All well worth the time to listen to.
Art is how we can transmute difficult emotions, difficult times into something beautiful. A kind of alchemy. I think that a lot of children’s book writers and artists do this somewhat intuitively, sometimes consciously, sometimes not.
This week some of the seeds I have been planting in my career-world have been breaking through the soil. I have been nurturing some of these seeds for years, and only now do they seem ready to begin to meet to sun and grow.
There is nothing linear for me about the creative process. It refuses to stick to planned schedule and percolates and takes form slowly. And maybe it’s the same thing with life. There is almost nothing that has gone to plan in my life- really, almost nothing. Funny. I’m trying to pay attention to the lessons and act accordingly.
When I drive I often times listen to podcasts. Yesterday I listened to one about people who had near death experiences… I’ve never had one, but I have experienced some unusual things that I cannot explain in a conventional way. One such thing was when my oldest nephew was born… that night I awoke in the middle of the night feeling the presence of my mom’s parents. It was a very specific thought that there was no doubt around. Then a little while later I received a phone call that my nephew had arrived. A little family check in. There is so much we don’t understand about the world…
I don’t remember dreaming much - if at all, on the little island. I journaled quite a bit, but there is little mention of dreams from that time…before we left for the misadventure, there we had a tagboard pinned with dreams and goals… everything is “before the little island” and after…After being a depleted state…and before being a rich and happy time. Maybe I’m idealizing, but I don’t think so…not based the evidence.
Do any of you have any sorries to share in the realm of dreams and things just beyond our comprehension? I’d also love to hear about your experiences with intuition or a kind of knowing that guided you in some way. I’d love to hear.
xo,
Steph